Madonna said she “became transfixed” by bright-eyed, 13-month-old David Banda – her soon-to-be-adopted son – the minute she saw film footage of him in the arms of a young, HIV-positive girl at an orphanage in Malawi.

Although there were “a lot of children” in the film – for a documentary she is financing about Malawi orphans – she was immediately taken with the baby, the pop superstar told Oprah Winfrey in an interview aired yesterday.

It was the singer’s first public chat about the child’s adoption amid international outrage.

“I later on asked who he was and what his name was. I started getting information about him . . . I was drawn to him,” she said of youngster, whose mother died shortly after childbirth.

“I did have my heart set on David,” the star said.

But Madonna, 48, also acknowledged that she had put together a short list of other Malawi youngsters she considered suitable for adoption because “I was told, ‘There is a possibility you won’t be able to adopt him.’

“I did meet other children I was open to adopting. If it hadn’t worked out with David, I would have considered any of those children a blessing.”

The singer said she went to Malawi not knowing whether David was HIV-positive, but had a pediatrician make the rounds at orphanages with her to take care of “testing David or finding out the health of the children that I was interested in adopting.”

The Material Mom said she and her British film-director husband, Guy Ritchie, had agreed two years ago that they would add an adopted child to their family.

“I wanted to go into a Third World country, I wasn’t sure where, and give a life to a child who otherwise might not have one,” she told Oprah.

Of the toddler’s dad, Yohane Banda, who recently said he didn’t realize adoption meant giving his son up for good, she said, “We had a [court] hearing with an interpreter . . . He looked into my eyes and said to me he was grateful I was going to give his son a life and, had he kept him in the village, he would have buried him.

“I didn’t need any more [confirmation] that I was doing the right thing and I had his blessing,” she said.

She blamed Banda’s recent remarks on press manipulation, saying, “I believe at this point in time he has been terrorized by the media.”

She said David is doing very well now.

“What’s really surprised me is how great my children are with him and how he has transitioned so easily from living in Africa in an orphanage to being in our house.”

As soon as he arrived, she said, her kids, Lourdes, 9, and Rocco, 6, “just embraced him.”

“That’s the amazing thing about children, they don’t ask questions. They’ve never once said, you know, ‘What is he doing here?’ or mentioned the difference in his skin color or questioned his presence in our life.”

As for David’s future, she said, “My goal . . . is that I will give David an education and a chance for a better life, and what better way for him to go back . . . and be a voice for his country than to be able to first have a life.”